Aalto industrial internet campus to test experimental 5G network

As part of the new 5G meets IoT project, the Aalto Industrial Internet Campus (AIIC) will soon be able to test the 5G experimental network that is being built in Otaniemi.

‘Our goal is to study the possibilities that 5G technology provides for applications of the industrial internet,’ says Professor Martti Mäntylä, the leader of AIIC, and explains that 5G is a great opportunity for industrial internet from two points of view. First of all, it makes it possible to use fast response applications with network latency of even one thousandth of a second. In a 4G network these applications are impossible or work poorly.

5G makes it possible to use fast response applications with network latency of even one thousandth of a second.

The other reason is related to the architecture of the network.

‘The network and the cloud cooperate in 5G, which means that many of the network’s properties are in the cloud and not in the actual devices. Thanks to the architecture of 5G, it will be possible for us to provide companies with private networks that exist inside the public network. In the future, a company can sell, for example, a frequency converter to Kuala Lumpur, and as soon as the converter has arrived and has been switched on, it will find the company’s private network and can then communicate and send data safely,’ Mäntylä explains.

In addition to Mäntylä, the other members of the Aalto community involved in the project are Professor Riku Jäntti and Staff Scientist Jose Costa-Requena from the School of Electrical Engineering and Professor Petri Kuosmanen and Research Manager Jari Juhanko from the School of Engineering. In addition to experts from different disciplines, companies from the field are already involved.

‘5G is expected to be working in 2020 at the earliest. We are trying to work out what kind of architecture would be required for the network to serve the applications of the industrial internet as well as possible. Once we find good solutions, we can standardise them and that way help software companies to provide new services and create business,’ Martti Mäntylä summarises.